Macbeth · William Shakespeare
SCENE II. The same. Another Room in the Palace.
Enter Lady Macbeth and a Servant. LADY MACBETH. Is Banquo gone from court? SERVANT. Ay, madam, but returns again tonight. LADY MACBETH. Say to the King, I would attend his leisure For a few words. SERVANT. Madam, I will. [_Exit._] LADY MACBETH. Naught’s had, all’s spent, Where our desire is got without content: ’Tis safer to be that which we destroy, Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy. Enter Macbeth. How now, my lord, why do you keep alone, Of sorriest fancies your companions making, Using those thoughts which should indeed have died With them they think on? Things without all remedy Should be without regard: what’s done is done. MACBETH. We have scorch’d the snake, not kill’d it. She’ll close, and be herself; whilst our poor malice Remains in danger of her former tooth. But let the frame of things disjoint, Both the worlds suffer, Ere we will eat our meal in fear, and sleep In the affliction of these terrible dreams That shake us nightly. Better be with the dead, Whom we, to gain our peace, have sent to peace, Than on the torture of the mind to lie In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave; After life’s fitful fever he sleeps well; Treason has done his worst: nor steel, nor poison, Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing Can touch him further.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.